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I’m Bob Larson. More than a week after Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson joined AGs from several other states in a lawsuit against the Trump Administration for further delaying the effective date of the Waters of the U.S. rule, no timeline for a decision is set.

Representative Dan Newhouse says he agrees with the 2-year delay imposed by the EPA and Corps of Engineers last Tuesday …

NEWHOUSE … “I think it’s absolutely correct to tell the EPA to go back to work with the states to come up with a rule that uses for the implementation some of the definition language, that was come up with by Justice Anthony Scalia before he passed away, that helped give clarity to the term navigable so it would also give clarity and, then in turn, to what waters we’re talking about as it relates to the authority of the EPA versus the states.”

Newhouse says as written, the WOTUS rule is over-reaching and lacks definition …

NEWHOUSE … “As the rule was going to be applied, it would have given the federal government the authority to regulate intermittent streams, even ditches along roadsides, areas that just don’t have water in except for certain periods of the year or over time maybe one year out of several.”

Newhouse says the decision to delay this onerous Obama-era regulation will give our ag community the certainty it deserves.